Department of Psychology, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany; Section Neuropsychology, Neurological Clinic, University Hospital Aachen, Germany; Interdisciplinary Centre for Clinical Research within the Faculty of Medicine at the RWTH Aachen University, Germany.
Neuroimage. 2014 Jan 1;84:786-95. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.09.037. Epub 2013 Sep 21.
A prominent proposal in numerical cognition states that our mental calculation abilities are grounded in the approximate number system (ANS). Recently, it was proposed that this association is mediated by numerical ordering abilities. As a first step in elucidating the neural correlates of this link this study tested which areas in the human brain carry information common to both calculation and numerical ordering. While lying in an MR scanner 17 healthy participants (a) decided whether or not a given number triplet was presented in numerically ascending order, and (b) solved simple addition and subtraction problems. Standard general linear model analyses revealed a largely overlapping network in fronto-parietal regions for both tasks. By analyzing the spatial information over voxels using a whole-brain searchlight algorithm we identified a right hemispheric network comprising areas along the intraparietal sulcus and in the inferior frontal cortex which was similarly involved in order judgments and symbolic arithmetic. Functional and anatomical characteristics of this network make it a candidate for linking the ANS to mental arithmetic.
数值认知领域的一个重要观点认为，我们的心算能力基于近似数量系统（ANS）。最近，有观点提出这种关联是通过数值排序能力来介导的。为了阐明这一联系的神经基础，本研究首先测试了人类大脑中哪些区域携带了计算和数值排序共有的信息。17 名健康参与者躺在磁共振扫描仪中，（a）判断给定的数字三元组是否按数值递增顺序呈现，以及（b）解决简单的加法和减法问题。标准的一般线性模型分析显示，两个任务在额顶区域有一个很大程度上重叠的网络。通过使用全脑搜索光算法分析体素上的空间信息，我们确定了一个右侧半球网络，包括沿顶内沟和下额叶皮层的区域，这些区域同样参与了顺序判断和符号算术。该网络的功能和解剖学特征使其成为将 ANS 与心算联系起来的候选者。
